


untitled

by lightsaberlesbian



Category: Humans (TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-16
Updated: 2018-07-16
Packaged: 2019-06-11 10:34:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15313608
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lightsaberlesbian/pseuds/lightsaberlesbian
Summary: Niska has a purpose and cannot allow herself to feel anything about her sister's death just yet.





	untitled

There are more people than you expected. Although, in a way you knew exactly how many people there would be and exactly how many there are out marching and holding vigils and memorials in the rest of the country; there are thousands of people altogether, synths and humans. A couple of hundred have gathered outside the building where Laura Hawkins tried to make a difference together with your sister whose body now rests still on the cold concrete.  
  
She’s gone, your sister. Dead. Your sister the leader, the speaker, has now become a martyr to the cause of equality. It’s a vital step towards a truce between synths and humans, the first real step towards peace, you try to convince yourself for the thousandth time, but at the same time, you know that there is no peace in death. There is nothing in death. Mia is simply nothing now; she’s an empty space inside of you that will never be filled again, a piece that is always going to be missing. You’ve been away from her and the rest of your family for a year and you’ve left them times before, but now there really is no seeing her ever again. Half of you doesn’t know what to do with that thought but when Mattie Hawkins departs from the crowd to head inside the building the other half reminds you that you know exactly what must be done. That is what you must try to focus on.  
  
You watch it from a distance, trying to imagine what she must look like up close. Like a saint, an icon bathing in warm, golden light with a halo of both living and battery driven candles, a beautiful symbol that will go down in history and pave the way for the change she fought so hard for. Like herself, in the garden of what used to be your home, peacefully feeling the always too tall grass brush against her palms and the breeze from the lake across her face; it made her feel truly alive, she used to say, alive and free. It’s a shame she had to die in where she did; nature was always her place. Had she been human there at least would have been the possibility of her being buried or scattered somewhere beautiful. What would happen to her now? People will want her on a display in a glass cage in some museum as a reminder of this day. It’s how humans remember but your brothers would never allow that.  
  
Your brothers. As your gaze shifts to the two of them kneeling next to Mia, it is as if someone opens a floodgate; immediately without warning their pain and loss streams through every fiber of your being with an unstoppable force strong enough to make you stumble back a few steps. It comes from every direction, both pushing and pulling and you desperately reach for something to hold on to. For a second it’s as if you’re just yourself again because their pain is yours too, but it’s too much and it’s too soon; you have a purpose and you cannot allow yourself to feel anything that fully just yet. You can’t, if you’re going to be able to complete what you really were sent there to do. You can’t fall apart if you’re going to help change the world. It’s unclear if it’s you or V that breaks the connection between you and your brothers, but you feel everything dilute and your mind clears once again. Half your mind, at least.  
  
Leo follows Mattie into the commission building; it’s almost time.  
  
Someone emerges from the crowd and heads towards you, you know it’s Astrid right away. She has always had a talent for finding you when you least want to be found, but when you probably need it the most. She’s wearing your jacket, a sweet way to represent you, and it occurs that you’re still wearing that hoodie of hers that you put on a month ago. Her cheeks are stained with tears and her eyes are red and puffy, you notice as you come closer. Either she doesn’t notice the color of yours in the dark, or she realizes that now is not the time for questions, anyway way she doesn’t ask.  
  
“I came right away. Niska, I’m so sorry,” she says, her voice hoarse and broken. She sobs softly as she wraps her arms around you, pulling you close.  
  
Astrid only ever met your family once. She had begged for it, to see the people you talk about more than you’d like to admit and the sister who has had more impact on you than she probably knows. Knew. So you had brought her with you to the rail yard and introduced her as the person you were going to live with from that moment on. The memory of saying goodbye is dug up from your hard drive, played before your eyes like a scene from a film; Mia gives you a tight hug you rather would have been without at the time, then lightly presses your foreheads together and hopes you’ll be happy. She turns to Astrid and tells her it was nice to finally meet her. Astrid takes your hand in hers as you both turn to leave.

If you’d known then that a year later your sister would leave _you_ for the first and last time, would you have made the same decision? If you had stayed, would it have made any kind of difference? Deep inside you know it hadn’t and that speculating what-ifs is nothing but a pointless distraction and a waste of time. But still.

 Somehow the fabric of your jacket on Astrid has ended up balled into your fists as you clutch to her. “I can’t stay. Please, light a candle for her in my place,” you ask her.  
  
“Already have.”

She is worried and wondering, still she doesn’t ask any questions, just kisses you goodbye, tells you to be safe and that she loves you. Astrid will have her answers when the time is right. For the moment you need to do what you can to make sure your sister’s death is going to mean something.

 


End file.
